Learn all you need to know about Scuba Diving from the experts at DIVE.in

Scuba diving allows you the freedom to explore the beauty and instant serenity of the underwater world, experience the feeling of being weightless, explore beautiful coral formations and see countless species of fish and aquatic animals.

Diving can be a weekend hobby for you, like it is for most of us. We usually meet up with friends early on a Sunday morning, returning with smiles from ear to ear in the afternoon.

Or maybe you’d like to take it further, like some people do, and choose to become a professional scuba diver. One good thing with this career is that you are making a living at doing what you love. A career in diving also allows you to travel to scenic areas and meet many unique people – the perfect job!

No matter how much of a scuba diver you’d like to be, let DIVE.in get you started. We will give you the dynamics of scuba diving in order for you to enter this amazing underwater adventure.

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This is why we love scuba diving

Jacques-Yves Cousteau

Cousteau was a Frenchman who started out as a gunnery officer in the French Navy. However, his naval career was cut short by a car accident in 1930.

Despite this, his passion and love for the ocean continued to inspire him, which eventually landed him as a seasoned oceanographer. He was co-inventor of the worlds first underwater camera named Calypso-Phot.

Underwater photography

Learn the skills of taking great pictures underwater - and your life as a diver will forever be improved. While diving is our life, we're still often forced to spend large portions of our life on land. That time is best spend showing those pictures to land animals.

GO PROFESSIONAL

Divemaster is the first level of professional diving. It allows you to assist in scuba lessons and serve as a dive guide.

Once you’re a divemaster, you may get the urge to want to teach diving to others. So the answer to this is becoming a Dive Instructor. But again, there’s a lot more in diving.

Snorkeling Equipment

Snorkeling equipment is generally used on the surface and in certain depths of water.

This is a pre-requisite gadget before SCUBA gear. It is highly suggested to start with snorkeling equipment because if you have to buy your own, this type of gear will fit your budget and it’s important that it fits comfortable.

The difference between scuba diving and snorkeling

The difference between Diving and Snorkeling

First let’s start with snorkeling and skin diving as most people think it’s the same sport.

Both include the mask, fins and snorkel.

Both practitioners spend most of the time in the surface, looking down at the world below.

The snorkelers will stay and enjoy the sights from the surface, whereas the skin divers will stay at the surface to get an overview of what’s down under the water. Skin divers swim down holding their breath and spend as much time as possible at the shallow reef.

Scuba divers don’t resurface for air, like skin divers, but bring down air to breathe in the tanks. Therefore they need additional equipment and more training. What to get better at snorkeling? Here's our Full Snorkel Guide.

So which one is the best: Snorkeling, skin diving or scuba diving?

It’s all comes down to what a person prefers. Some people like the overview you get from the surface as a snorkeler, but some like the fact that they can spend more time underwater with scuba gear and close in better under the water. Skin divers get both the overview and the close up, the only drawback being that they have to resurface.

Diving and Snorkling Equipment

We can generally classify two kinds of diving equipment categories based on their usage and function, the snorkeling and SCUBA equipment. Read the Full Guide to Snorkel Gear. As a scuba diver you’ll be introduced to a lot of new dive equipment. An essential piece of SCUBA equipment is the tank that holds the air you breathe on your dive.

You’ll also need a regulator set, consisting of a regulator mouthpiece and a first stage, which is attached to the tank. In addition, there is a pressure gauge, which lets know how much air you have in your tank, and an alternative regulator, just in case you or your buddy needs a spare regulator.

Learn How to Scuba Dive - with the different scuba organisations

To learn scuba diving it is not enough to just read this article alone or read other references; it requires proper training from a certified instructor.

There are several diving agencies that offer diving lessons. All of these agencies employ the same diving principles and theories with the only small difference in the standards.

Quoting its slogan “The Way the World Learns to Dive”, it is the largest diving agency. It offers very simple courses all the way up to becoming a professional diver.

If all you’d like to do is try scuba diving because you just want to get a feel for it, you can enroll in the PADI Discover SCUBA. In this course will be closely accompanied by a professional dive instructor while diving in a shallow and confined area. After this you can continue diving and become a certified diver.

PADI offers diver certification from Open Water, Advanced Open Water, Rescue Diver, Divemaster, Master Scuba Diver and five different levels of PADI Dive Instructor. They also offer specialty courses on night diving, photography, Medic First Aid and so much more. PADI support environmental and conservation programs and their banner program on this is Project A.W.A.R.E. – Aquatic Wildlife Awareness Responsibility and Education.

SSI: Scuba Schools International

This began from a group of divers who wanted everyone to learn scuba diving. From this it grew worldwide reaching more than 100 countries and is taught in 25 different languages.

Their diver certification programs are very similar to PADI, but it’s often a cheaper alternative. That said, the quality of training does not follow the price, but keeps the same top standard.

CMAS: Confederation Mondiale des Activities Subaquatiques

This organization is duly recognized by the Olympic Committee and one of the oldest dive training systems.

It also promotes other diving skills as a sport like monofin swimming. Its diver certification program is the same with other agencies, but uses stars to determine certain certification levels. One star means Open Water, two stars is a mix of Advanced and Rescue, and three stars for Divemaster. These stars are colored red. Blue stars represent different instructor levels.